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Friday, 21 September 2012

A market in the
Turkish-dominated Kottbusser Tor area of Kreuzburg, Berlin. One in five
people living in Germany have an immigrant background. Photograph: Ray
Tang/Rex Features

One in five people living in Germany
now comes from an immigrant background, according to figures released
on Thursday. They show that the minority community grew by more than
1.3% last year at a time when the overall population is falling.
Figures
from the German Federal Statistical Office show that the number of
people with immigrant backgrounds living in Germany increased by 216,000
from 2010 to 2011. Multiculturalism has been a fiercely controversial
topic in Germany in recent years, engendering vigorous debate over the
integration of immigrants, many of whom moved to the country in the
1960s as guest workers from Turkey. There are now 16 million people with
an immigrant background living in Germany – 19.5% of the country's
population.
Although Germans have discovered a greater affinity
with their minority communities thanks to the exploits of football stars
such as Mesut Özil and Sami Khedira, there have been a growing number
of voices challenging the value of multiculturalism. This week, the
mayor of Berlin district Neukölln, Heinz Buschkowsky, argues in a new
book that multiculturalism has failed.
There is some evidence that
the most recent rise in immigration has been caused by economic
refugees from southern European countries as a result of the euro
crisis. But the debate habitually falls back to the integration of the
Turkish community, which represents the highest number of immigrants in Europe's biggest economy.
"Many
politicians and policymakers see integration politics as a way to
create a homogenised society rather than encouraging equal political and
social participation for everyone in Germany – integration is
well-intentioned but ill-implemented," said Gökçe Yurdakul, a social
scientist specialising in diversity and social conflicts at Humboldt
University in Berlin.
The issue has driven a wedge between Germany
and Turkey in recent years, most notably when Christian Wulff, the then
German president, was told by his Turkish counterpart, Abdullah Gül,
that Germany should be doing more to help Turks integrate into German
culture. This followed claims by the German chancellor Angela Merkel
that multiculturalism had failed.
Some experts disagree, saying
integration is already happening at a local level. "You can see that
integration is happening through local initiatives and civil society
organisations putting efforts into living together in a diverse
society," said Yurdakul. However, the efforts were not reflected on a
national level and politicians still had a long way to go.
"[These]
policies are trying to get people equal access to labour markets,
politics, education and healthcare, but on the other hand it's
ill-implemented because it's used to restrict immigration in Germany."
Then
there are those held up as successes of integration such as Özil, who
is descended from Turkish immigrants and considered a national hero.
Younger
people are starting to make an effort to reach out to the Turkish
communities to integrate themselves with their neighbours. Marlene
Schliepach, 26, is studying to become a kindergarten teacher and started
learning Turkish two years ago in an effort to be able to talk to the
children she will be caring for.
"I'm learning Turkish because I
want to convey to my Turkish students that I, as their teacher, and as a
German, value their language," she said. "Lots of teachers want to make
them focus on only learning German. But integration has to go both
ways."
Some, such as Tim Panhorst, 27, are learning Turkish
because of family connections to the culture, but think it is important
for Germans to attempt to reach out. "I wasn't really learning it from
school, but from friends and relatives because my brother is married to a
Turkish girl," he said.
"But when I meet Turkish people and speak
to them in the language, my experience is that they are always glad
someone German can. It's always a way of connecting, and in a positive
way."
• This article was amended on 20th September 2012 to correct
the figure of 1.3% relating to community growth in the first paragraph.
It previously read 13%.